Many of us working in offices suffer from all range of health problems such as elevated blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, etc. the list here goes on and on. Our modern lives usually force us into habits that are detrimental to our health and well being. Fortunately for us, there are some great changes that can be made in order to remedy the situation and ensure that we live healthier lives. Here are some ideas:

1. If you work in an office building chances are that it has several floor levels. Swapping your elevator for stairs is a great way to have your heart pumping. Don’t use the elevator only because everybody else is doing it. Try to be original and reap the benefits now.

2. Try to encourage your boss to buy health screening packages for all the employees. There are multiple benefits of such packages and no boss should overlook the importance of having healthy people to work for them.

3. Limit your coffee intake. I am aware that drinking caffeine is part and parcel of the life of every office and that everybody consumes a lot of it from the morning, but if you find yourself that you need to rely on it to make it through the day this means that you are in trouble. Try to reduce it gradually as even the slightest change in caffeine in your system can give you headaches you might want to avoid.

4. Consider using office sports equipment to get as much exercise as possible while you work or during breaks. This is a rather innovative idea that has found its way into offices. You can find on the market a number of bikes, treadmills, etc. that are designed with office users in mind. you can still get a large portion of your work done while burning calories on an exercise bike or while walking on a treadmill. You just need to be creative about it.

5. Have a lot of drinking water available near you to allow you to be hydrated at all times. This is especially important if you consume a lot of coffee as coffee can cause your body to lose water. Aim to drink at least 2 litres of water per day.

Bills, work, family stresses, deadlines. Life can get hectic and leave you feeling anxious, stressed and freaked out. Prolonged anxiety can lead to feelings of restlessness, a sense of dread and constantly feeling ‘on edge’. It’s not a happy place to be. And whether you experience anxiety every once in a while or suffer from severe anxiety, the condition is probably having a negative effect on your life.
Maybe you feel like it’s time to make a change but feel put off by common anxiety medications which can have a string of unwanted side-effects. Well, guess what? Popping a pill isn’t the only way to get your anxiety under control.

Here are our top tried and tested ways to beat anxiety naturally:

STAYING ACTIVE

You’re probably sick of people claiming exercise is a cure for everything. But that’s because it’s true! Regular exercise is amazing for both your physical and emotional health. Scientists have found that regular aerobic exercise is able to decrease levels of tension and elevate mood. And it’s not just a short-term fix. Anxiety relief can continue for hours after working out. It’s simple – if you’re not moving, get moving!

CHAMOMILE

A cup of chamomile tea is incredibly calming, and if you’re not a fan of herbal teas, it can be taken as a supplement. While it’s unlikely to have the same effect as a chemical anxiety medication, studies have shown chamomile to be effective in promoting relaxation and helping with anxiety, insomnia and depression. Some of its compounds bind to the same brain receptors as drugs like Valium. Calming and tasty? Definitely worth a try!

WEIGHTED BLANKETS

Weighted blankets for anxiety are inspired by the calming technique of deep pressure stimulation. Blankets are designed to apply gentle pressure over the body to prompt relaxation, similar to the feeling of a hug. The pressure helps to relax the nervous system and encourages serotonin production – that’s the chemical which makes you happy! Weighted blankets also reduce the stress hormone cortisol, which in turn, will help to ease your anxiety symptoms

MEDITATION

Taking 30 minutes time-out daily to meditate could really help to alleviate your anxiety symptoms. The main aim of meditation is to remove chaotic thought from your mind, replacing them with a feeling of calm and focus on the present moment. Check out these meditation exercises and give them a go next time you’re feeling on the edge.

AROMATHERAPY

Aromatherapy uses aromatic essences (essential oils) to heal and promote health and well-being. Essential oils have been known to help lift the symptoms of anxiety, and comes with a multitude of other benefits, too! The fragrant oils can boost your mood, improve your complexion, stimulate creativity, help you to sleep calmly and even reduce stress – a winner all round. Add the oils to a warm bath or diffuser – lavender, bergamot and grapefruit are favourites for anxiety relief.

VITAMIN D

If you find your anxiety goes in a downward spiral when the winter hits, you could be lacking in Vitamin D. Vitamin D deficiency is (mostly) caused by a lack of exposure to sunlight and has a direct link to a person’s mental health. People who have seasonal affective disorder (SAD) show symptoms of anxiety, irritability and antisocial behaviour. Therefore, a short walk in the sunshine or a daily vitamin D supplement could significantly help to boost your mood – give it a go!

Anxiety can seem impossible to beat without resorting to medication – but that’s not always the case. Improving the symptoms of your anxiety disorder could be achieved by making a few simple changes to your lifestyle. Make it your mission to try out as many natural methods as you can – don’t let anxiety control your life.

 

Sometimes you need somewhere to retreat to. You need privacy, you just want to relax and enjoy your hobbies, be they gaming, watching slasher movies or enjoying sports without interruptions of judgement. If you’re moving in with a partner or starting a family, this need can become acute – you don’t even have a bedroom to retreat to.

The answer could be to turn a spare room into your own safe haven, your mancave. Today we’re looking at how you can set up the mancave you need to retreat from the world!

Preparation

First of all, you need to create a blank canvas to work with. Don’t just shove boxes aside in your spare room, attic or basement. If you can’t unpack them and give the contents a home, look for London storage options, to keep your clutter safely contained, in a self-storage unit.

Once you’ve emptied the room you’ll be using, give it a good airing out, and a clean. You might also want to paint it: think about the colour scheme you’d like, and whether you’d want comforting, richer colours or light colours that emphasise space and light.

You might also want to consider patterned wallpaper to create a unique effect – getting inspired by your favourite books and TV shows is a good way to go when you’re creating a den like this. Perhaps it could be your own version of Baker Street!

Personalisation

The next step is realising that there is no one template for the perfect mancave. This needs to be your personal relaxation and retreat, so make sure it’s perfect for you. Think about the ways you like to relax, and make sure you have everything you need to indulge yourself. If you’re into gaming, you’ll a comfortable chair, a big tv and shelves for your consoles and games. If you’re more of a craftsman and tinkerer, your mancave will need to be more of a workshop!

It doesn’t have to cost the earth: looking at sites like Freecycle and Craigslist can get you cheap or free furniture to get you started. You could always replace them with nicer alternatives piece by piece over the months and years.

Sharing

One thing you have to question is whether or not it’s fair for you to simply disappear into your own room, leaving your partner alone, or caring for children. If they don’t have their own equally private space, you might be taking a liberty too far. If you’re looking for privacy when you start a family, it might make more sense to convert your mancave into a shared ‘grown ups’ room where either partner can take a break from the stress of parenting.

Everyone has to handle some amount of stress every day of their lives. Nothing ever goes perfectly. Things break. Other people are unpredictable. Stuff happens. But especially when things happen inside of family situations, the stress can be overwhelming. And that’s when you have to start protecting your mental health.

What are some situations where mental health may become an even higher priority? Are you going through a divorce? Are you moving to a new area? Are your children misbehaving? And finally, are you going to changing economic circumstances? All of the situations inside of your family structure can mean that stress reaches higher levels, and you have to do more to protect your mental clarity.

Divorce

If you’re going through a divorce, everything can get complicated, and your mental health can suffer. If you have to figure out spousal maintenance as you’re going through your separation process, you can feel overwhelmed and distressed. Having a lawyer help you out the details can be a considerable alleviation to your personal stress, and making sure that you keep in contact with family members who do support you will also go a long way into ensuring that your anxieties don’t get the better of you.

Moving To a New Area

Moving your family to a new area can be hugely stressful. You have to decide how to pack your house up. You know at least subconsciously that many your spending habits are going to have to change. Your sense of familiarity is going to go out the window. If you’re starting a new job, that means things are made even more difficult on everyone. So your mental health is going to suffer. Knowing this, keep lines of communication open with family members and recognize that everyone is going to be chippy at each other until the move is complete.

Misbehaving Children

Dealing with misbehaving children is something that no parent or adult likes. Unfortunately, it is a part of being responsible for a younger human being. Even though it may be painful to punish a child for misbehaving, you have to figure out where to draw the line with behaviors that can eventually be dangerous especially.

Changing Economic Circumstances

Going to changing economic circumstances puts a significant stress on the family as well. Often the pressure comes when a parent gets laid off for their employment is somehow reduced. But, if suddenly someone is making a lot more money, that presents a whole other set of issues. Other family members may feel entitled to more of those resources, which makes you feel emotionally and mentally like you’re being used. Take small steps to ensure that everyone is on the same page psychologically when these changes in financial circumstances occur.

 

As much as we have control over health and safety in our home environments, we should try to maintain that same sort of applicability in work environments as well. If you’re in a position as an owner or manager, you have specific attributes that you can work to maintain. However, if you’re an employee or a customer at a place of business, there are things that you can do as well.

Keeping healthy and safe means different things in different places. There is physical safety in construction zones. There is researching what common workplace injuries are so that you can avoid them. In office environments, there are ergonomic options that help with health and safety. Also, tangentially, if you think about snacks or other food that are available in workplaces, that contributes to health as well.

Construction Zones

In a classic example of physical safety, you have to wear safety equipment around construction zones. Have you ever noticed that everyone at a construction site has a hard hat on, and should be wearing work boots? That’s because, in construction sites, things fall all the time. Nails, screws, bolts, pieces of construction material – all of those things are potential hazards, which is why the safety equipment is required in the first place.

Typical Workplace Injuries

Sometimes to know how to stay healthy and safe at work, you have to understand what common workplace injuries are in the first place. If you’re not aware that carpenters hit their fingers with hammers or that dental assistants suffer from sore backs, then you might not know what to do to prohibit those issues from happening. There are plenty of places that you can research workplace injuries, and then you can adapt your behaviors from there.

Ergonomic Options

In office environments, there are all sorts of very subtle workplace injuries that can become more severe over time. Back pain, wrist pain, leg pain – all of these can happen because of bad ergonomics. As a manager, you can provide employees with ergonomic chairs, and that will resolve a whole host of issues. Getting them standing desks can also help with some of the mobility issues that happen in the long-term.

Snacks and Nutrition

As much as you want to avoid injuries from falling objects or bad chairs or dangerous equipment, keeping yourself healthy is also about putting the right fuel in your body as well. The workplace that sells candy bars and snack machines and energy drinks is going to end up being a less healthy place than somewhere that they sell fresh fruit and sandwiches. Especially if you’re in charge of this as workplace manager, try and make nutritionally dense options available to your employees, and their good health will improve.

 

Recovering from a substance addiction can prove to be by far the greatest challenge, and struggle, people can face in their lives. Trying to face this most difficult task on your own is extraordinarily difficult, if not virtually impossible for most people. Those who are facing severe alcohol or drug addiction find their very best hope for recovery in seeking professional help to fight this life-threatening situation. And the sooner they recognize their problem, and seek the assistance they need to fight and beat the addiction, the much greater chance they can recover and get their life back again.

Addiction doesn’t discriminate. It affects everyone- all races, sexes, social stratas, sexual orientation, and ages have great numbers of people that are suffering substance addiction on one level or another. Fortunately, there are outstanding programs and treatment facilities, like the pinnacle recovery center, that are there to help.

Highly qualified, professional recovery centers fully recognize that addiction to different substances necessitate treatment specific to that given substance that person is addicted to. Types Of Treatment Programs For Addiction will focus specifically on the given substance of choice. These centers don’t merely offer a “one-size-fits-all”, all-encompassing program for all substance addictions. This is very important for people to recognize if they want help, and are looking at potential recovery centers to start getting this help.

Superior recovery center programs will provide rehab for users addicted to alcohol, cocaine, meth, opiates, Xanax, and heroin. These centers, fully staffed by professionals with extensive experience in addiction treatment, make it paramount that each individual patient is diagnosed and treated with a personalized treatment plan of recovery.

The in-depth treatment provided by experienced caretakers and case managers include a variety of treatments and therapies, with critical inpatient rehabilitation being at the very core of a successful, lasting recovery.

Addiction is often the result of some deeper, unresolved issues in someone’s life. Counselors and patients will have very in-depth, personal talks about various aspects of the patient’s life, which in turn helps to formulate their specific, personalized plan. Inpatient rehab integrates combined therapies, dual diagnosis, and case management to really take the addiction on effectively.

Inpatient rehab involves any treatment the client receives while living onsite at the treatment facility for the duration of their specific treatment. The first 30 days of a client’s recovery are especially difficult for them, both mentally and physically, so the 24-hour care they receive while being at the facility is critically important. Depending on the level of severity of addiction the client is experiencing, programs inpatient typically range from 30-90 days. If after the full time spent in this program is still not enough, those who are seeking help should look for a treatment program and facility that offers Long-Term rehab. These programs, ranging from 90 days up to one year, are mainly for people who have tried and failed to get clean more than once in their past.

Outpatient rehab provides valuable treatment services to clients that simply cannot spend at least 30 days in an inpatient program, or for those clients who may not necessarily need the intensive attention and care that the inpatient program provides. It’s a terrific option for those who need help, but not quite at the level that necessitates inpatient care.

Since clients have all different types of responsibilities with varying schedules in their lives, outpatient rehab is also tailored to the client’s availability. Though treatment in outpatient rehab is less intensive than that experienced in an inpatient situation, the same amount of support and care is provided to the client here.

As mentioned, there can often be a mental health component that could be a fundamental element in a person’s addiction. In times past, a mental health situation OR an addiction was diagnosed and treated, but not both concurrently. Today, there are dual-diagnosis treatment programs that address these two critical issues together. Healing with treatment for one affliction, while not addressing the needs of the other often leads individuals back to their destructive behavior. Often, the substance use will mask the underlying problems people don’t really see due to their increasing substance use. Counseling with trained professionals may very well uncover this dual diagnosis, helping to put together a treatment plan specific to both the mental and physical components to this person’s given situation.

Clients can benefit immeasurably from both individual therapy, where they can really open up and build a solid relationship with their counselor; and group therapy, where they can share their experiences, and learn from others who are in the same, or very similar, circumstances they are currently in.